An Individual Development Plan is a career-planning tool used in both academia and industry. It is a document that describes an individual’s career and/or educational goals. It is developed through conversation between a mentor and a mentee.
The 2024 updated NSF Proposal & Award Policies & Procedures Guide (PAPPG) (NSF 24-1) has new requirements for graduate student and postdoctoral support. In addition to the mentoring plan required to be submitted with proposals that request support for graduate students and/or postdocs, “for each NSF award that provides substantial support to postdoctoral scholars and graduate students, each individual must have an Individual Development Plan, which is updated annually, that maps the educational goals, career exploration, and professional development of the individual. NSF defines substantial support as an individual that has received one person month or more during the annual reporting period under the NSF award.”
NSF’s website points to online, interactive IDP resources at myIDP.sciencecareers.org, chemidp.org and imaginephd.org.
To supplement these resources, we share the template Individual Development Plan that LSST-DA uses for the Catalyst Fellowship program. Feel free to adapt and tailor this resource to your own needs!